Will the Saudis Kill the Arab Spring?: Vali Nasr

May 24 (Bloomberg) -- In his speech last week on the Middle
East, President Barack Obama left little doubt that America
stands with the people of the region in their demand for change.
This puts the U.S. on a collision course with Saudi Arabia.

The kingdom has emerged as the leader of a new rejectionist
front that is determined to defeat popular demand for reform.
One would have expected Iran to lead such a front, but instead
it is America’s closest Arab ally in the region that is seeking
to defeat our policy. Though the president made no mention of
Saudi Arabia in his speech, in the near term, dealing with the
kingdom is the biggest challenge facing the U.S. in the Middle
East.

Saudi rulers have made clear that they find U.S. support
for democracy naive and dangerous, an existential threat to the
monarchies of the Persian Gulf. If the U.S. supports democracy,
the Saudis are signaling, it can no longer count on its special
bond with Riyadh (read: oil).

The Saudi threat is intended to present U.S. policymakers
with a choice between U.S. values and U.S. interests. The idea
is that either Washington stays the course, supporting the Arab
people’s demands for reform, and risks a rift with Saudi Arabia,
or it protects that relationship and loses the rest of the
Middle East.

In fact, the choice between U.S. values and interests is a
false choice, as the president made clear in his speech. Now,
American policy has to reflect this truth. So far, Washington
has tried to placate the Saudis. It is time we challenged their
words and deeds, instead.

Tectonic Shift

It’s no surprise that the tectonic shift in Arab politics,
a popular revolt calling for reform, openness and
accountability, worries the Saudi monarchy. The kingdom, like
the rest of the Arab world, has a young population that wants
jobs, freedom and a say in politics. Thirty-nine percent of
Saudis ages 20 to 24 are unemployed. Having watched Egyptian
President Hosni Mubarak step down amid protests in which
Egyptian youths played a key role, Saudi King Abdullah announced
$35 billion in new social benefits to head off demands for
reform at home. That bought the monarchy time, but too many
dominoes are falling in its direction to allow for complacency.
Violent protests on Saudi Arabia’s borders, inside Bahrain and
Yemen, have been particularly troubling.

From the outset, Riyadh encouraged every Arab ruler to
resist reform. The more Washington embraced the Arab Spring, the
more Riyadh worried. Saudi rulers took particular exception to
Washington’s call for Mubarak to resign, and when the U.S. urged
reform in Bahrain, they saw U.S. policy as a direct threat to
them.

Encouraging Dialog

Washington had encouraged Bahrain’s king, Hamad ibn Isa al-Khalifa, to enter into dialog with the opposition there, and
American diplomats were directly involved in mediating talks. An
agreement was almost at hand when Riyadh took the rare step of
undermining U.S. policy. Saudi rulers persuaded Bahrain to
scuttle the talks and bring in troops from Saudi Arabia and the
United Arab Emirates to suppress the protests.

The weak excuse for this clumsy crackdown was that Iran was
orchestrating the protests and Iranian expansionism had to be
stopped in its tracks. A local protest inspired by popular
demonstrations in Tunisia and Egypt was transformed into a
regional conflict. The Saudi strategy was clear: shift the focus
from democracy to the bogeyman, Iran.

Emboldened by the outcome in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia has
mounted a regional strategy to defeat the Arab Spring. Riyadh
has called for expansion of the Gulf Cooperation Council, a
group of Arab countries that are oil-producing and sit on the
Persian Gulf, to include Jordan and Morocco, which qualify on
neither count.

Mollifying Protesters

The expansion would transform the GCC into the Arab world’s
club of monarchies. Membership would provide cash-strapped
Jordan and Morocco ample financial resources to mollify angry
protesters. In return, they would have to abandon reform and be
prepared to lend their more serious militaries to put down
protests should they erupt again in Gulf states.

Saudi Arabia’s new posture is a serious challenge to U.S.
policy. Conceding to Saudi demands will put America on the wrong
side of a widely popular historical transformation in the
region, and thus will only hurt U.S. interests in the long run.
Bahrain’s heavy-handed suppression of protests has already
dented American standing in the region.

Having Saudi Arabia deliberately ratchet up tensions with
Iran is also risky. The Persian Gulf monarchies don’t have the
military muscle to back their aggressive policy toward Iran.
Their credibility depends on U.S. support. And if baiting Iran
escalates tensions in the Gulf, U.S. interests and the sheer
size of its military presence there will inevitably put the U.S.
in the middle of the conflict.

Confronting the Challenge

For all these reasons, the U.S. needs to confront the Saudi
challenge head-on. Failure to do so will hurt our standing in
the region and alienate public opinion there, which will only
benefit Iran.

The U.S. should assert its leadership role in the Middle
East. It should make clear that, our close ties to Saudi Arabia
notwithstanding, we will be as vigilant in pushing for reform in
Bahrain as in Libya or Syria. Washington should be prepared to
act if the monarchy in Bahrain doesn’t end its crackdown and
start a meaningful dialog with the opposition. We should also
make clear to Jordan and Morocco that America supports their
reform initiatives and won’t look favorably on reversing course.

It’s true that we rely on the GCC for oil, but there will
be no interruption in the flow of oil if we disagree with the
Gulf states. Their livelihood depends on oil; to profit from it,
they must sell it. Moreover, the GCC countries need us to
protect their security, as was made amply clear in both wars
with Iraq. What should concern us, then, is not the Saudi
threats but rather how the people of the Middle East will judge
our policies at this critical juncture in their history.

(Vali Nasr is a Bloomberg View columnist. The opinions
expressed are his own.)